FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108  
>>  
s country's service the life that seemed of little use to any one else. Here, on the coast, where the danger was most real and present, people drew together in the sympathy of the one great anxiety, and the lonely man felt as if, in coming back to England, he had really got among friends, who were all ready to talk and tell the latest news and discuss the common safety with him as if he were indeed one of themselves. He liked the fisher folk, too, in the villages round about, they were so frank and simple and kindly; and once or twice he had been out in their boats, for after the hot southern climate he had come from he felt as if he could not have too much of the fresh salt air. And there was always excitement, too, in the Channel in those days, when even a fishing-boat might have to make sail and get away at her best speed before a French privateer. When he got back to Plymouth late in the evening after his talk with Kiah Parker he found every one in a state of great excitement. The landlady of the lodgings he had taken during his stay there was eager to tell him the latest news. A frigate had come into the port just at sundown with a fine prize--a French gun-brig, taken after a stubborn fight in which both vessels had suffered severely. The first lieutenant had brought the ship in, the captain being wounded and disabled, but the whole place was ringing with his praise. It had been a most brilliant capture, only the greatest daring and most skilful management could have carried it out. Two brigs had both attacked the English frigate, and she had made a feint of flight and then turned on them and managed to sink one and disable the other. She would have to wait for repairs. So much the good landlady had told before her lodger could ask a question, and when she paused for breath he inquired whether she knew the name of the English ship. Certainly, the _Mermaid_ frigate, Captain Maitland; heaven send he was not badly hurt, poor gentleman! Had there been any loss? Not many killed, she thought, a matter of one or two men, and one officer downed, but a many wounded, they were in hospital; and she branched off into stories of sailor friends of her own, while her lodger tried to remember why the name of the ship and the captain were so familiar to him. It came back to him later in the evening, when he was reading his paper after a solitary supper. It was a midshipman of the _Mermaid_ whom he had nursed in
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108  
>>  



Top keywords:

frigate

 

excitement

 

Mermaid

 
lodger
 
landlady
 

wounded

 
English
 

French

 

evening

 

captain


latest
 

friends

 

managed

 

flight

 

turned

 
question
 

repairs

 

disable

 

attacked

 
ringing

praise

 
brilliant
 

disabled

 

capture

 

paused

 

people

 

carried

 
greatest
 

daring

 

skilful


management

 

present

 

sailor

 

stories

 

officer

 

downed

 

hospital

 

branched

 

remember

 

supper


midshipman

 

nursed

 

solitary

 

familiar

 

reading

 

Captain

 
Maitland
 

heaven

 

Certainly

 

inquired